New Beginnings

In August the weather turned cool and rainy. There was suddenly a feeling of autumn in the air. Here and there the trees became tinged with yellow or red, the mountain ash hung heavy with red berries.

There are 3 major areas in which I feel the need for new beginnings: One is my career, one is preparation for old age and the third is finding an anchor in a larger reality than the physical which is inexorably winding down.

I enjoy following my childrens progress into adulthood:
Audun has embarked on a long distance relationship with a girl in Bosnia.
Tormod is in USA working to get a foothold in a career in Security.
Irene has spit up with her boyfriend and moved into her own place, and has gone back to High School to finish her High School Diploma, and her new interrest: hiking and camping.
Ingvild is learning to juggle school and a new job on weekends and afternoons at a cafe in Stange.

Cancer. It seems to be all around. Father is actually doing pretty well. Mother and Father have decided on staying at the farm. My mother-in-law however is experiencing a relapse of her breast cancer 10 years after she had her masectomy. There is new growth in the lymph nodes as well as metastases in the lungs. The good news is that it is a slow growing type of cancer. She has started hormone therapy which is supposed to keep it in check.


Tor is doing well with his pigs. The first lot were a handfull and quite rough, biting and charging him when he tried to clean their pens. Now, with the second lot he has learned organize their care around their character, feeding first so that they are busy eating when he is cleaning their pens, then they are satisfied and tired when he comes to give injections or tag their ears and so avoids the whole circus. But his mothers illness has been a source of some stress and worry. Hopefully a week in Crete will help him wind down.

In orienteering I have been practicing A-level courses. They are considerably harder than I am used to. In one 3.5 km course I spent 2hrs because I managed to turn the map upside down at the 3rd to last controll ending up at the opposite end of the map from where I should have been. As I made my way back and further toward the goal the sun shone lower and lower through the trees and I began to fantasize what I would do if I was still wandering about in the woods when it got dark...
At another training where I spent 90 minutes it was pouring rain so badly, and the clouds were so dark that I could hardly read the map, and ended up missing the last controll. However I signed up for the Veteran Championships in my age group. First time ever. The course was only 3.1 km so I thought I'd be ok, until I realized that I was one of the latest starters. About half way through I stopped seeing other orienteers in the woods, but still heard the loudspeaker system from the goal area. As I approached the goal (there were 3 controls right in the area around the goal) the loudspeakers became quiet. When I finally ran to the finish at 1hr and 40 min I was the absolute last person in. In fact Tor told me that they had asked him about 10 minutes earlier whether they should send a search party out to look for me!

There are 3 areas of my own life where I feel a need for new beginnings.
The first is my career:
I'm thinking of applying for further education. I will be 50 in the spring. It feels like now or never. Sept 1 is the deadline for Midwifery school, Oct 1 for nurse anesthesiology and intensive care. And possibly in November it will be possible to apply for emergency care nursing...

The second is health and fitness:
I continue to gain weight. Am now 20 lbs over my comfort weight of 20 years. I've been having problems with a muscle or tendon or something in my arm as well. The doctor said weight lifting would help as strenghthening the surrounding muscles would protect the hurting one. And again, I think of the fact that I am pushing 50, and menopause cannot be far away. So - I have started a regime of (nearly) daily resistance training and pilates, with handweights, resistance band, and excersize ball. Also since September first I am going to the gym a few times a week for spinning classes, as the orienteering season is winding down. I worry that worrying about weight, etc makes me superficial. However my body is the instrument I have for this life and if I don't take care of it especially now that the aging process can be expected to accellerate I would be limiting my possibilities for contributing in the world.

The third is spirituality:
I keep getting the feeling that life will be over in a few years, and I don't know if there is anything after, or if there has been any point to anything. Is my experience just subjective or is there some lasting meaning? Is life just a phase and death a threshhold to a different existance with new adventures and tasks or is it all nothing. I cannot live ignoring this need to get things into perspective any longer. To this end I have begun reading Emanuell, a book my godfather sent me many years ago. Also I have started going to First Class again after a 15 year break. I am trying to take 5-10 minutes 3 times a day for excersises in relaxation, visualization, meditation, concentration etc, using techniques from the Silva method, anthroposophy etc. Finally I have started rereading and reworking the 7 Habits of highly effective people by Stephen Covey.